Service Learning Activism Log #1

Activism:

                This week our liaisons attended the YAYA meeting. However we still have not made contact with our global partner, which is one of our goals for next week. The class has generally been communicating well; we have a meeting planned for Thursday to discuss fundraising and the final strides that need to be made before next week. We have been having a hard time getting full class involvement in a lot of the planning, and it has been taking much longer to get things done then it should, which has made us fall behind in fundraising. And of course another big problem is that we don’t, technically, have a global partner. Within the next week we have our big event at the community garden in Fellsmere, so we will be accomplishing that as well as, compiling donations. Also, we need to organize a committee to make sure we enter into the Service Learning Showcase. Working in such a large group has demonstrated how difficult it is to organize and actually accomplish goals, especially when everyone has other priorities. The group has also experienced first- hand the struggles of organizing with a diverse group and the issues of tokenizing, everyone keeping themselves in check, willingness to understand others and grow as a group.

Reflection:

                Not only this week’s events, working toward our participation with the community garden, but the entire project is in response to what Sarah Swider describes in Working Women of the World Unite?, about the lives of migrant domestic workers. She explains that domestic workers are often separated from their families, travel to keep work, and are under the control of their employers, she continues to say, “Isolation plus a complete one-on-one relationship make it difficult for domestic workers to advocate for better working conditions” (112).  This is similar to the conditions that farm workers face, and it is also the reason why they have decided to create a community garden, they want access to better and more sustainable food. This week’s events have changed the way I see global and transnational feminism, I see that it’s very difficult for people of different backgrounds and experiences to collaborate; even though I really don’t understand why if everyone is kind and respectful to each other that we allow discourses to get in the way of relationship building.

Reciprocity:

                Through this project I have learned so much about the farm worker community, which I think is very important living in Florida. I have become very interested in continuing my participation with YAYA and the farm worker community after this project. I think that I and the class are also benefitting their community by working with them to accomplish their goals of creating a sustainable source of food; and by supplying material donations they asked for. Also, I know I am gaining the experience of actually working with and meeting these diverse individuals and understanding a part of their story, beyond what I can read about.

Word Count: 496

Works Cited

Swider, Sarah. "Working Women of the World Unite?" Global Feminism: Transnational Women's Activism, Organizing, and Human Rights. By Myra Marx. Ferree and Aili Mari. Tripp. New York: New York UP, 2006. 110-12. Print.

Revised Service Learning Proposal

Date: 3/15/12 To: Professor Tweed

From: Nichole Restivo

WST 4015 Revised Service Learning Proposal

Mission Statement: To fight for agricultural justice and women’s rights in the farmworker community through fundraising and volunteering with YAYA and communication and cooperation with our forthcoming global partner.

Organizational Structure:

Secretary: maintains records (including attendance) and Google group

Scheduler: maintains calendar and plans event attendance.

Task-based committees (headed by a Committee Chairperson who acts as liaison for the committee and ensures meeting efficiency)

Community partner liaisons (2): communicate with community partners and attend YAYA meetings

Global partner liaisons (2): work with fundraising committee

Ethics Committee (3): ensures mindful action, implements “three strike” policy

Fundraising Organizers (4): responsible for coordinating an event and/or delegating responsibilities to other members to ensure hat we are able to provide at least $190 (for food), 19 rakes and 19 shovels to the YAYA community garden project.

Three Strike Policy:

•    Failure to complete a task or attend a designated event results in one strike

•    First and second strikes result in voting restrictions

•    Three strikes results in a meeting with the ethics committee and Professor Tweed 

Members are accountable for their own attendance and participation. If a member is unable to attend an event, she or he must notify the scheduler. The Ethics Committee and “three strike” policy were conceived to deal with situations where a member fails to meet these standards.  Democratically structured, our group focuses on working with our community. We have modeled our organizational strategy based on NGOs who use task-based committees to foster efficient goal achievement. Women, Food, and Agriculture Network (WFAN)-- as discussed in Women’s Activism and Globalization-- employ a similar structure, fostering personal responsibility in order  to “instigate change” by building community and sustaining relationships with farmworkers (144).  Our ethics committee is cognate to the UN, in that it will monitor the efficacy and ethical compliance of our project. Just as in “Unlikely Godmother,” Margaret Snyder characterizes the United Nations as a “godmother,” which acted as a guardian and advocate for women’s issues (25). We are facing the global challenge of migrant farmworker rights based on local realities, specifically the lack of resources to farmworkers in the community of Fellsmere, FL. We will be participating in discussion that takes place on a global level with our global partner. By building solidarity between our local and global partners, and ourselves, we will either discover or develop new ideas to cater to the needs of the farmworker population.

  

Group effectiveness will be measured by involvement of the majority of class members at each event, as well as our ability to fulfill each of the goals we have set. We are also considering the individual gains of each class member, outside of the group as a whole, to be an accomplishment of overall group effectiveness. This includes phone banking with YAYA, fundraising, and planning. We will also strive to maintain sincere communication and ethical interactions with each other and our community partners. We will assess ourselves via individual surveys on group effectiveness.

Community Partner/Global Theme Profile

We propose to address the larger systemic issues of the treatment of farmworkers, with an emphasis on women farmworkers. We know that "women produce 70% of the food on earth but they are marginalized and oppressed by neoliberalism and patriarchy" (What Is 1). These systems of oppression often deny those who produce the food equal access to the products they produce. As the price of food increases and becomes scarcer, women become malnourished, "as they eat last after providing for their children and family members" (Desai 21). One possible way of addressing this issue is to "produce food for local consumption" (Desai 24). To lay a foundation for both environmental and production sustainability, it is key that the community eats the food it grows. Local production and consumption can also indirectly address situations of "unsustainable exploitation of workers," who are denied not only equal access to food, but also other resources, such as safe housing and acceptable working conditions (Two Years 1). By establishing themselves as producers of their own food and giving recognition to both the unpaid and poorly paid labor, farmworkers can pave the way for change in regard to equal access and fair treatment.

We have not yet been able to contact a global partner. However, when we do, we will be able to find out more about their needs and goals as they relate to our own and therefore participate in both shared learning and activism.

By working in solidarity with YAYA, we are supporting activism enacted “to change the oppressive social, political and economic conditions of farmworkers” (“About”). Human rights violations such as those our local farmworkers face are worldwide issues and are experienced in many forms across many communities. While YAYA is “[i]nspired by the principles of nonviolence of the farmworker movement,” we are inspired by the efforts of YAYA and the organization’s slant towards working with, not simply for farmworker communities (“About”). As we work with each other and with YAYA, we will cultivate ethical activism through focusing on our communicative and social interactions.

  As we learn about Global and Transnational Feminisms this semester it is important to become aware of global issues and how to be successful global “feminists” or advocates on an international stage. As Trinh Minh-Ha writes about in Woman, Native, Other, the “traditional” way of engaging global communities is a Western one that happens to function under many assumptions as a way to define people, instead of with a community to learn from and with them and therefore truly about them (62). Through service learning, which UCF considers to be, “a teaching method that uses community involvement to apply theories or skills being taught in a course,” we plan to work with communities that are not necessarily our own, in an effort to gain insight, but more importantly gain the experience of working with a group to achieve a goal. Because we are reading and currently learning how to engage such groups of people through this course, and actually creating moments where we will this semester, our project is service learning and gives each of us practical experience in not just the community but on a global scale on how global feminist organizations and NGOs work to accomplish common goals. 

 Project Proposal

Our intention for this project is to forge relationships with farmworker communities on a local to global level, with a focus on women and how their lives are impacted by the work they do. We will accomplish our goals by dividing them up between the various aforementioned committees. We will begin developing a relationship with our local community partner, YAYA, by attending meetings and fulfilling their requested needs for gardening tools and long sleeve shirts. We will also be participating in the Fellsmere Community Garden Event, where we will be gardening and sharing and preparing a meal, while also learning from one another. We will determine the needs of our global partners through email and meet whatever need(s) that they express at that time.

We will complete our service-learning project via our combined resources as individuals, the resources we have available as UCF students, and the resources of our Orlando community. Through the expertise of YAYA and FWAF, we will be able to better understand the ways in which we can use our resources to best serve the needs of the farmworker community. We will be communicating as a group in order to continuously reevaluate our initial methodology, resources, and group organizational structure, in order to best serve our goals.

One of our immediate goals in supporting YAYA and FWAF in the Fellsmere community gardening day is to fundraise one shovel and one rake per student. Another goal is to fundraise the cost per person for our visit, which includes meals and transportation. These goals are feasible because we have access to different types of resources that will help our fundraising efforts, such as on-campus technology to create fundraiser advertisements, as well as access to various campus organizations that may support our fundraising events. Our most important goal is to support our community partner and their sustainable relationship building with farmworker communities. Our fundraising efforts will provide the Fellsmere community with the tools that they currently need and will use in the future. We will also be providing labor within the Fellsmere community garden and helping with the upkeep of the plots, a service that FWAF has asked YAYA and our Global class to provide. Through this project, we hope to help YAYA strengthen their established relationship with the Fellsmere community, and that through our collaborative efforts, we will create a sustainable relationship with our community partner.

Project Timeline:

• February 22: Initial contact with Lariza Garzon of YAYA to confirm partnership
• February 24: Contact Global Partner 
• March 1: In-class presentation by YAYA

• The historical events that have led to the current oppressive conditions of the agricultural industry
• Solidarity (sustainable relationship), privilege, power dynamics, etc.

• March 10: Fundraising Event
• March 17: Fundraising Event 
• March 31: Participate in YAYA’s Community Garden Project:

8 am Depart Orlando from NFWM office

10 am Arrive To Fellsmere

10:15 am Welcome, introductions and instructions

10:45 am Gardening begins!

1:00 pm Lunch (vegetarian options available)/ short soccer game

 2:00 pm Back to gardening!

4:30 pm Debrief

5:15 pm Dinner

6:00 pm Depart Fellsmere

8:00 pm Arrive to Orlando at NFWM Office

• TBD: Debriefing meeting

Word Count: 1,736

Works Cited

Desai, Manisha. "Transnational Solidarity: Women's Agency, Structural Adjustment, and Globalization." Women's Activism and Globalization: Linking Local Struggles and Transnational Politics. By Nancy A. Naples and Manisha Desai. New York: Routledge, 2002. 15-33. Print.

Experiential Learning Office. "About Service-Learning." Office of Experiential Learning. University of Central Florida. Web. 23 Feb. 2012. <http://www.coop.ucf.edu/Overview/Options_and_Definitions/Service-Learning/About_Service-Learning_95_270.aspx>.

Naples, Nancy A. "The Challenges and Possibilities of Transnational Feminist Praxis." Women's Activism and Globalization: Linking Local Struggles and Transnational Politics. By Nancy A. Naples and Manisha Desai. New York: Routledge, 2002. 267-81. Print.

Trinh, T. Minh-Ha. Woman, Native, Other: Writing Postcoloniality and Feminism. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1989. Print.

“Two Years After the Events…” La Via Campesina: International Peasant’s Movement. La Via Campesina International Peasant’s Voice. 12 January 2012. Web. 23 February 2012.

“What is La Via Campesina?” La Via Campesina: International Peasant’s Movement. La Via Campesina International Peasant’s Voice. 9 February 2011. Web. 23 February 2012.